The highly anticipated Labour Party expanded stakeholders meeting which held in Umuahia, the capital of Abia state, yesterday September 4 has affirmed and upheld the position of the Abdulwahed Omar led National Transition Committee (NTC) that the tenure and national executive council of Julius Abure expired since in June 2024.

The stakeholders, led by the only governor of the party, Governor Alex Otti of Abia state, and Mr. Peter Obi, the party’s presidential candidate in the 2023 elections, included elected national and state lawmakers throughout the country.

Also in attendance were members of the Board of Trustees of the Labour Party recognized by the NLC consent judgment of March 20, 2018, leaders of the Nigeria Labour Congress Political Commission and its frontline constitutional compliance advocacy organ, the Labour Party National Transition Committee (NTC) which has led the party’s struggle to take out the expired Abure NEC since its inauguration on April 8, 2024.

Welcoming the stakeholders to the meeting, Governor Alex Otti opened the event with a rousing background on the rationale for the meeting, stating that stakeholders must not allow the Labour Party to die because it was the only hope to redeem Nigeria from its present dire governance challenges.

Otti assured attendants that any speculation that he or Peter Obi might leave the Labour Party for another party in the future was unfounded. He emphasized that they were no going anywhere outside the Labour Party because, according to him, if they left the Labour Party because it had crises, there was no guarantee that where anyone was leaving to was not worse. “Anyone doing so would be deceiving himself,” Otti asserted.

Buttressing the NTC case and advocacy of several months, Governor Otti further stated that he had carefully studied in detail the Justice Gabriel Kolawole consent judgment of 2018 and its requirement to conduct an all-inclusive national convention within one year of the judgment, as well as the subsequent INEC brokered terms of settlement signed by Abure with the NLC as an institutional stakeholder of the party, both of which agreements Julius Abure and his NEC defied consistently till they undertook the Nnewi convention and which was boycotted by INEC.

Otti also cited the two occasions where INEC expelled Abure from its meetings some weeks ago, and concluded that the consequences of those actions were clear indications that the party was in danger of having no recognized lawful leadership in the electoral commission’s records. This, according to the governor, left a vacuum that needed to be filled urgently, hence the expanded stakeholders meeting had become imperative.

Governor Otti further reflected that if the Labour Party under Abure had fielded or participated in any inter-party election after Abure’s tenure expired in June this year, all candidates of the party would have suffered the fate of court annulment in favour of opposition parties similar to the precedents of Zamfara and Plateau states. It would be recalled that this was the implication which the NTC, inaugurated by the NLC Political Commission under Comrade Abdulwahed Omar’s chairmanship, had been raising alarm about and advocating against for several months.

On his part, speaking during the event Sen. Victor Umeh, representing Anambra Central Senatorial District at the Green Chamber of the National Assembly, also spoke in line with Governor Otti. Sen. Umeh disclosed that early in the year, he painstaking studied the NLC consent judgment of 2018 and advised the Julius Abure group against the Nnewi convention, but his advice was was unheeded.

NTC in the New Scheme

It would be recalled that responding to the resolutions of the Umuahia stakeholders meeting, the embattled former chairman of the.Labour Party, Mr. Julius Abure, had rejected the resolutions of the stakeholders, including the announcement of former minister Sen. Esther Nenadi Usman as chairman and Sen. Darlington Nwokeocha as secretary of the party’s new caretaker committee respectively.

In their own response, the leadership of NLC Political Commission headed by its Acting Chairman, Prof. Theophilus Ndubuaku, and the commission’s National Transition Committee headed by ex-NLC president, Comrade Abdulwahed Omar, made clarifications to the press in Umuahia.

Prof. Ndubuaku stated: “Yesterday in Umuahia, the whole world, elected and status leaders of our Labour Party, from their Excellencies Peter Obi and Dr. Alex Otti to members of the House of Senate and House of Rep, including governorship aspirants from the six geopolitical zones, publicly recognized and embraced what the NTC led by Comrade Abdulwahed Omar has been saying on rooftops since April this year. That Abure’s tenure has ended since June 9, 2024. This is our first collective victory and a major triumph for the Labour Party nationwide. “Today therefore marks a new beginning and chapter for Labour Party nationwide.”

On the formation of a national caretaker committee for the party, Prof. Ndubuaku said: “You will recall that only the chairman and its secretary have been proposed and announced.

“It is a struggle we started from beginning to today, absolutely with our own resources and virtually without help from our elected and relevant leaders of the political class in the Labour Party. At the minimum, we ought to be acknowledged and consulted in the formation and appointment of the caretaker committee’s members, especially such critical officers as chairman and secretary. We were not.”

“Even though not consulted as I stated,” Prof. Ndubuaku went on, “the NLC Political Commission and its NTC committee believe that the Peter Obi and Alex Otti led organizers are reasonable leaders who desire the unity, harmony and rancour-free cohesion of the party going forward.

“We are therefore optimistic that this time they will seek the NLC Political Commission’s and TUC’s opinion, give us our rightful say in the ratification of the chairmanship and secretary appointments they have announced, as well as the composition of the remaining proposed 27 members strength of the committee.”

Prof. Ndubuaku continued: “We also believe that if there is a need to expand the proposed National Caretaker Committee beyond their present proposed 29-member mark, they will do so. That will demonstrate that they are listening leaders who understand that every stakeholder, especially critical blocs like the NLC, TUC and other entities of our party should be carried along to have a sense of belonging for our overall membership growth, national expansion and progress.”

In the above light, it shall be imperative for the incoming National Caretaker Committee or transition NWC, if I may use the expression, to consciously accommodate in the coming days the legitimate wish list of the NLC Political Commission and its NTC committee, which have been at work since April.

Making further clarifications, Prof. Ndubuaku confirmed that it was true that INEC was not present at the Umuahia expanded stakeholders meeting to witness and enroll the resolutions announced in their books and portals to make them legally final.

“That is why only two officers, the chairman and secretary, were announced. The remaining 27 members or more shall be listed hereafter and subjected to harmony promoting consultations before they are announced and inaugurated in the course of time.”

“In conclusion, the Labour Party is on course for better and brighter days,” Prof. Ndubuaku concluded.

At press time, it was learnt that the NLC Political Commission is in discussions to re-name, retain and sustain the Labour Party National Transition Committee (NTC) as an organ of strategic conflict management, engagement and resolution, policy study and programmes development of the NLC.

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